A brazen thief who snatched four dogs from outside their homes in rural Perthshire, sparking a nationwide manhunt, has been jailed and banned from keeping animals.
Clifford Hodgkins stole three Jack Russell terriers and a Springer Spaniel from remote properties in the Blairgowrie area.
He lifted one dog out of its kennel and bundled it into a car, while its horrified owner looked on.
Three of the dogs were later found more than 400 miles away, in different parts of the English West Midlands.
The Springer remains missing, almost two years on.
Hodgkins, 40, was found guilty of the thefts at two properties in Meikleour and Forneth in October 2020, following a trial at Perth Sheriff Court.
He was further convicted of a separate animal neglect charge, after a “crying” lurcher-type dog was seized by animal welfare teams from a property in Rattray, near Blairgowrie.
Jail time
Hodgkins, who has an extensive criminal past, was jailed for 90 days and fined £500 for the thefts.
He was fined another £400 for the animal neglect charge.
Hodgkins asked the court for “no time to pay” and was handed a further 28 days in prison.
Sheriff Francis Gill issued a disqualification order banning him from keeping animals for two years.
He also ordered that the lurcher dog – still in the care of the police – be rehomed.
Stolen in front of owner
Ally McLaren, 22, told the trial that he watched Hodgkins steal working dog Harvey from a kennel outside his family’s home in Meikleour.
He said he looked outside and saw a blue Ford Focus, with Hodgkins standing nearby dressed in a snood-type covering and camo jacket.
“He picked up Harvey,” said Mr McLaren. “I ran outside and asked: ‘Excuse me, what are you doing?’
“He said: ‘Nothing’.”
Hodgkins, who Mr McLaren said had visited the house two weeks earlier, put the dog in the Ford Focus and drove off.
Mr McLaren filmed the car leaving his property and later shared the clip on social media.
‘Unthinkable’
Hodgkins, from Kidderminster, also took two Jack Russells and a springer from a house at Forneth that same day.
At the time, their owner, gamekeeper Craig Brown, told The Courier: “I never saw what happened to them.
“I had been working on the estate and came back to find the kennels empty.
“It was just shocking, unthinkable. We’d never imagined anything like that could happen here.”
The trial heard that the blue Ford Focus was found “abandoned” and hidden among polytunnels in a field near Blairgowrie.
Hodgkin’s DNA was found on the handbrake.
Police said dog poo found in the vehicle was a match for one of the dogs stolen from Forneth.
Tell-tale DNA evidence
Tree surgeon Hodgkins denied the thefts.
He told the court he was in Aberdeen that day, with his girlfriend.
Asked by fiscal depute Andrew Harding about the Ford Focus, Hodgkins said it was “a known criminal’s car” and “it was owned by one of the lads on the estate. Everyone used it”.
He said he had been in the car before, but only as a passenger.
Mr Harding asked why his DNA was on the handbrake, when he hadn’t driven the car. Hodgkins replied: “Doing handbrake turns and stupid things like that.”
Dogs found in England
The court didn’t hear what happened to the stolen dogs, but we reported at the time how two-year-old Harvey was found days later roaming around the village of Dodford, Worcestershire.
Another dog was handed into a vet in Bromsgrove, while a third was found in a park some 11 miles away.
It has never been revealed how the dogs ended up in that part of the country.
The thefts sparked widespread disgust on social media, following an appeal by the Missing Pets Perth and Kinross group.
Case of animal neglect
Hodgkins was found guilty of neglect earlier this month, following a separate trial at the same court.
Police and the SSPCA swooped on a property at MacDonald Crescent, Rattray, following claims a lurcher-type dog had been left chained up outside in sub-zero temperatures.
They found the dog, called Bruce, tethered in the back garden with only a half-built wooden shed for shelter.
The court heard Hodgkins had bought the animal for £400 after seeing it advertised on the internet.
“I bought it on the Friday and the police came and took it on the Sunday,” he said.
He was found guilty of failing to provide Bruce with a suitable environment and limited its movement by tethering it to a chain between November 27 and November 29 2020.
Hodgkins failed to provide the dog with adequate shelter, exposed it to the elements and failed to give it a warm, comfortable resting area.
